


Destitution

by Acai



Series: A Collection of Works in Which Undertale is Sad [1]
Category: Undertale
Genre: Angst, Bad Dreams, Brothers fluff, Depressed Sans, Depression, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff with Angst, Fluffy, Hurt/Comfort, Long One-Shot, Nightmares, One-Shot, PTSD, Papyrus is a Good Brother, Resets, Sad, Sans and Papyrus fluff, Trauma, longish anyway, sans is scared and smol, undertale - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-20
Updated: 2016-01-20
Packaged: 2018-05-15 03:06:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5768968
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Acai/pseuds/Acai
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The one where Frisk promises that there won't be another reset, but Sans can't help but be terrified of what's never going to come.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Destitution

**Author's Note:**

> i just really like being sadistic and making Sans sad. RIP @ Sans.

Your name is Sans and you are a skeleton. You can’t remember your last name as of right now, but you don’t think you really care enough to try and actually remember what it is. For now you’re just Sans. For now, Just Sans is good enough.

Your name is Just Sans the Skeleton and you don’t know where you are.

Correction: You don’t know _when_ you are. You know that you’re in your room in your house in Snowdin in the underground world of monsters that you’re trapped in. That’s not the only thing that you know, either. You know a lot of things. Your name is Just Sans and you know _more_ than everyone else down here in the whole underground society put together.

You know what they’ll do if you walk into Grillby’s and announce that you no longer like ketchup. You know what they’ll do if you walk into Grillby’s an hour late and then proceed to tell them that a human is in the underground. You know what they’ll do if today you just march into Grillby’s the same as always. You know what they’ll do if you don’t go in to Grillby’s at all.

You think that today of all days is a day that you should not being going in to Grillby’s, anyhow. Today—you know what today is. It’s _always the same day._ It’s always the day that the human comes down here. Sometimes it’s perfectly fine. Sometimes a little kid comes out of that door and skips over a twig. Sometimes they walk out with a bright little smile and a stomach full of cinnamon-butterscotch pie and they’re still warm with the hug that Toriel’s just given them. Sometimes they walk out of those doors with a creepy grin lazily planted on their face. Sometimes they’re covered in dust. Sometimes they’re holding a little toy knife.

You learn each of their separate names. The little girl that’ll give you hugs and who’ll take you to the world above so you can feel the sun on your bones and so that you can watch the sun rise in the morning and set in the evening, the one who everyone loves and the one who comes to save the day—that’s Frisk. You think you’re alright with Frisk. As a matter of fact, the first time that you met Frisk, before you know that they could do _this_ to you, you actually kind of liked Frisk. They were funny, indulged Papyrus and went along with his little puzzles and games, you rather liked hanging out with them.  


But then they reset this world. They’re the one who did this. They’re the one who came back as Chara, who kills your brother _every single time._ Every time you watch them _kill_ him. Every time you watch Papyrus die, and every time you die right along with him. Every time you hate Chara a little more and love Frisk a little less.  


You don’t know if Frisk decides who to come back as each time. You aren’t sure if when they beat this world and take you all to the top for a month or two they decide they’re tired of being good and go back to killing you all—you don’t know if they tire of having to kill you all and go back to having sweet and innocent eyes.

You don’t know. You don’t ask. You don’t think you’ll ever ask.

You know, sometimes, that when it’s Frisk they remember everything that they’ve done. There was a time when you thought, surely, that Chara and Frisk were two completely different people. You know they’re the same person, though. You don’t even have to ask. They’re… well, not the same person. But it’s Frisk that chooses to become Chara, and it’s Chara that chooses to become Frisk. Which means there’s a little bit of Frisk still in Chara, who remembers that they’re all friends and that they have fun with you all and that Toriel is her ‘mother’ and that she went on that little date with Papyrus and that she helped Undyne and she helped Alphys and Undyne get together. You know that there’s some Frisk in Chara.

But, at the same time, you know that there’s just as much Chara in Frisk. Frisk, your lovely little Frisk, who’s sweet and innocent and indulges your brother and who takes naps with you places and who buys little looks through your telescope every reset—there’s still a piece of them that remembers killing your brother. Who remembers killing Undyne. Who remembers killing Toriel. Who remembers killing _you._ Innocent little Frisk…they’ve killed you all. Over and over and over and over and over again, they’ve killed so many times. They’ve killed _everyone in this world so many times._

But they’ve also saved them. And, since you’re counting, they’ve saved everyone twice as many times and they’ve killed them. Which doesn’t make up for killing them…but you can’t really do anything about it, now can you?

So you keep your relative peace. Relative meaning that every time that kid resets you follow the script just like they do. It’s a careful script that they’ve put together, it’s a careful world the way that things always happen the exact same way. But you’re _so tired of things happening like this._

You wake up one morning above ground under the stars. The real stars, and you’re staring at them. You wake the next morning in your bed back in Snowdin. It’s a never ending cycle and you can’t take it anymore. Sometimes you think about just _stopping._ Where’s you determination now, huh? Nowhere, because you haven’t got any—but you keep coming back anyway, because dammit you don’t have a choice. You’re just a toy to that kid, just a pawn to play with and… and you really can’t be so mad at them.

They know it kills you every single time. Frisk never shows it, except for the times that it’s just you two in Waterfall and they pay you absolutely nothing to use your telescope and they give you a little apologetic look every time as they keep walking.

Chara’s a real charmer, though. When they kill you— _oh god,_ when they kill you every time they give you the wickedest grin and you just know they’re counting, too, how many times you’ve gone down in front of them.

But you can’t hate Frisk. You can never hate Frisk. Because in the end, Frisk is still the one who brings them all up to the surface each time. In the end, it’s Frisk who shows them the stars and the sun and who’s the reason their faces are all lighting up the way that they are.

But it’s killing you. You can’t do this anymore. You can’t keep reading the script and following the plot every time that one of them wants to reset. You _can’t do it._

One of these times you want to wake up and just lie in your bed. You want to do absolutely nothing and see what happens to the timeline then. Maybe if you just off yourself at the start of each timeline you won’t have to keep going through them. Sometimes your really do think about it. But then you wonder if everything would work out the same and you decide no, it probably wouldn’t. You’re not willing to risk spoiling the aboveground for your friends.

It’s a silly thought, the thought that you’re so important that you’ll effect the timeline like that. Still…you can’t risk that. You can’t risk stopping them from the only thing they really want. Because really? They’ve seen it so many times before, but they don’t remember that. They don’t know that. Only you and the kid know that.

You still can’t help but want to be done with this whole mess. You think the kid starts to know that. It’s Frisk, this time, and they look pained when they tear their eyes away from you and continue on through Waterfall. You can’t keep doing this. You offered them a look through the telescope, but the offer was flat and halfhearted and god you’re tired, you just want to sleep. But you can’t sleep, because what happens if you go to sleep and wake up and…you’re just right back in bed in Snowdin? You’re terrified of that bed. The first time you woke up in that bed and met the human, you were interested. You were entertained and yeah, okay, a little excited. That was back when your bed was still comfy and warm and bearable.

Now? Now you wake up there and choke back a scream. It’s horrible. It’s never-ending, and there’s literally no way to win.

 _Kill the kid!_ You have. They always come back to kill you instead.

 _Kill yourself!_ You die enough anyways. You always come back in the end.

 _Destroy this world!_ Chara did that just fine, thanks. The world comes back when the kid gets bored of skulking in nonexistence.

 _Don’t do….anything._ That is indeed what you do. You follow the script. You wake up in Snowdin. You follow the script. You wake up in Snowdin. You follow the script. You wake up in Snowdin.

You’re late up one morning. You woke up back in that bed. You couldn’t take it anymore. You shoved your face in a pillow and screamed. You screamed through the pillow and wow are you glad that Paps gets up early because you know he would have come running.

Then you cry. You break down in little sobs where you sit and ball your fists up in the sheets and want this to stop. It was fun, at first. Now it’s torturous. It never ends, it never changes, you just watch people die over and over again and nothing matters, anyways, because you’ll all just do it again! You don’t know how _long_ it’s been. You don’t know how many _years_ have gone by. You don’t know if it’ll ever stop. You don’t know if Chara will get tired of killing or if Frisk will ever get tired of saving.

One time you make the mistake of hoping. You spend so long waking up on the floor of a house aboveground that you think to yourself— _maybe? Maybe this is it and it’s finally over? Maybe all of this is finally over and Frisk won’t reset again!_

You go to sleep on the floor content.

You wake up and the first thing you feel is the softness beneath you. You feel blankets above you and pillows underneath your head. You scream yourself hoarse.

You follow the script. You hate the script. There’s no point to any of this anymore. What are you even doing? Why do you keep following the script? Why not be creative and make new things up? Switch things up a bit, entertain yourself, c’mon, Sansy! Live a little!

That would take too much work, though. That’s the only reason you like the script. You’ve got it memorized. You don’t need to think.  All you need to do is go through it again and again like the zombie you’ve become.

You’ve got it down, though. The stage cues, the emotions, the things you need to do. No one knows this is a script but you and the kid. And they’re enjoying themselves, you can just tell.

Oh god, they’re having the time of their life with this, aren’t they? Ha! You bet they are!

You watch Chara kill Papyrus again.

You stop counting the number of times this has happened. You hate this. You hate living. You hate existing. You hate resets.

You wake up in your bed in Snowdin. When you shake Frisk’s hand it’s just a little too tight. You can see them wince as they accept your hand. _Good,_ you think. _Good, yeah, maybe that’ll be part of the script too, now. That’d be nice. I’d like that. Give them just a little bit of pain for once in their life, too! Let them see how it feels to be hurt!_

You release poor Frisk from your grip and recite your lines. Frisk goes about their merry way. Frisk does their thing. Frisk brings you all up to the top. You catch their eye when they clamber up and lead your friends to the top. You can’t tell what they’re thinking, this time. You don’t think it really matters, anyway, because you’ll just do this again, what, tomorrow? The day after that? And after that? Does time even _really_ exist anymore? Has Frisk screwed it too far over?

Everyone is admiring the sky. You inform Papyrus of what the sun is. You feel empty when you say it. It was endearing the first time. Now it just drains you of your last bit of energy.

“Sans?” The kid says, looking over at you. Well now, hasn’t this piqued your interest? This hasn’t happened before, this isn’t a part of the script—could it be that the kid is sprucing things up a bit? Gotta keep the audience entertained, and all, isn’t that right?

(Maybe you’re bitter. You have a right to be bitter.)

“Yeah, kid?” You ask, not looking over at them. You look at the sun instead. Who knows when it’ll be ripped away from you again. You’ve always loved the sun a whole lot.

“This is the last one,” they tell you, and you snort a little. They frown at you a little bit, before grinning widely. “This is the last one. No more resets ever again—we’re really done.”

“Is that so?” You ask, unwilling to think of a pun to go along with this one. You aren’t even sure what you have to work with. Maybe something to do with resetting….? Nah, too much work.

“Yeah. I don’t need to do anything else and it was gettin’ a little boring so… I decided this was the last one. We’re staying this time.” You open your mouth to feed Frisk a sarcastic reply that you haven’t actually thought up yet when Toriel beats you to it.

“Staying where, Frisk, dear? What is the last _what?_ ” Frisk just hums a little eight note tune.  You sigh. You want to believe Frisk—and you know they’re dead serious about this.

But what happens when they bore of this, too? What happens when they remember that there was _just one more thing_ that they wanted to do before calling it quits?  


Then you go back. You couldn’t take that. Not again.

You hope to God Frisk isn’t lying.

You wake up in Snowdin. You scream.

You start screaming and you can’t stop.

You tear back your covers and run outside to find Frisk and _screw the fucking script, you’re going to claw their eyes out where are they where are they? They promised! They promised you! They promised! Oh god you can’t take this._

They don’t show up this time—where are they? Oh God, you’re gonna—you’re gonna—you don’t know anymore.

You scream louder, falling onto the ice and digging your fingertips into it. It starts to melt. You fall.

 

You jolt out of sleep and tumble out of your covers onto the floor.

You—oh god, it was just a dream. You’re not in Snowdin you’re not in your bed you’re not—

You’re on the floor.

You fell to the ground and tore back your covers and…that means you were in bed. You weren’t even _twenty minutes into the last timeline and_

You can’t stop screaming. You can’t stop shaking. You can’t stop sobbing. Hands grab you and you get tangled in them and screech harder.

“Stop,” you beg. “I can’t do this anymore. I can’t, I can’t, I can’t, I can’t. Please just _stop doing it.”_  You beg Frisk to stop even though there’s no way this is Frisk, because who knows where Frisk is. You keep screaming and writhing out of the grip until you peel your eyes open and _shit, you woke up Papyrus._

You stop screaming. You wail instead. Your face presses into his chest and you sob until you ache and your throat aches, too.

He doesn’t say anything.

He really is a very good brother.

You wish you told him that more often.

He deserves to hear it all the time.

Why don’t you tell him  more often?

You’ll tell him in the morning.

…

“Papyrus,” you whisper.

“Sans,” he says back, and his voice isn’t his. It’s _his,_ but it’s soft and a little bit concerned.

“Papyrus,” you breathe. “I just…I wanna…where…if I walked outside right now could I go to the Librarary?”

“No, Sans, the Librarary is in Snowdin.”

“And we’re not,” you verify. He confirms. You sob harder. He thinks you miss it. You shake your head so violently that he shuts up and just lets you cry into his shirt.  
You feel pretty bad.

  
They keep happening, the dreams. You always wake back up in Snowdin. You go out to find Frisk, sometimes you do and you go along with the script. Sometimes you don’t.

But you always end up sobbing and screaming into your brother’s chest like a five year old. You can’t help it. It’s so _uncool,_ but you’re not in this to be cool anymore. You aren’t gonna lie—you’re terrified you’re going to wake up there again. You can’t do that again.

They happen less and less. Sometimes you dream it, still. Sometimes it’s a very real dream. But in the end you always end up back aboveground in the real morning.

The screaming comes to a stop, though. Now it’s just silent tears that trickle down your face while you slouch against him. He never makes you talk about it. You never tell him about it. You feel bad, all the same, not telling him.

You don’t know if you’ll ever tell him.

You don’t know if you’ll ever tell anyone.

Maybe Frisk will.

You can’t help but wonder if Frisk’ll get bored someday.

You hope they won’t.

You’re just starting to believe them, anyhow.

**Author's Note:**

> Check out my other works for more stories like this one and feel free to leave a comment telling me what you think, a kudos if you enjoyed and always feel free to leave prompts for future one-shots! 
> 
> ..contact me..  
> Link to my fanfiction: https://www.fanfiction.net/u/6799875/  
> Link to my Wattpad: https://www.wattpad.com/user/romcomtragedy  
> Link to my tumblr: http://romcomtragedy.tumblr.com/  
> Skype: irasciblecorsair  
> Kik: blue_four


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